Promises to Keep (29 page)

“I don’t know. Twenty-nine? Thirty? How old are you?”

“Thirty-three. So I’m pretty much a kid too.”

“Nah. It’s just that I’m forty so I’m older than everyone now. Anyway, no idea if he’s single or not. Want me to find out?”

“No. Absolutely not. The last thing I need right now is some sexy, heartbreaking handyman.”

“Sexy!” Amy spits out the tea she was drinking, with laughter. “You and I sure as hell don’t share the same taste in men.”

 

Two hours later, they are still sitting there, covering all the topics in each of their lives. Steffi, quite unexpectedly, has found herself telling Amy about Callie. She isn’t even sure why, or how it came out, but Callie fills her thoughts almost all of the time, and she hasn’t been able to talk about it with anyone.

Amy’s eyes fill with tears as Steffi tells her how scared she is, and she reaches over and lays her hand on Steffi’s. “Any time you need to talk, you come and sit here with me,” she says, and Steffi nods, swallowing the lump in her throat.

“I mean it,” Amy says. “My mom died of cancer. I’ve been through it. I know what it’s like. And I also know what it’s like to be going through this alone. I have this feeling you and I are going to be great friends anyway, so we may as well skip the whole getting to know you bit at the beginning and jump straight into crying on each other’s shoulders, don’t you think?”

Steffi nods again, then glances behind Amy at the clock on the microwave.

“Oh shit!” She leaps up. “Sorry, sorry,” she apologizes, glancing around, looking for the children, but they have long since disappeared. “My family is coming in an hour and I totally forgot to go shopping. I’m making lunch.”

“What are you making?”

Steffi tells her, then promises to make some extra to drop in later for Amy and Big Tucker.

“This will be the first meal of many.” Amy walks her to the door and reaches out, giving Steffi a huge bear hug, surprisingly firm for someone so tiny. “Stay strong,” she whispers.

Steffi waves as she pulls out of the driveway, her heart singing at the knowledge that she will not be entirely on her own anymore. She loves this life, loves the solitude, and knows it will be even better if she has friends.

She doesn’t need many. Lord knows she doesn’t have time for many, at least not now, not until Callie is better. She is going to the hospital again today, with the rest of the family, and she will go every day to accompany her sister on this journey.

So, just a friend or two, and perhaps a distracting affair with a dangerous-looking handyman who is
exactly
, but
exactly
, her type.

“O
h Steffi!” Honor’s eyes fill with tears as she stands at the kitchen counter and pours out glasses of champagne. “It is just beautiful here. I can see exactly why you love it.”

“It’s the freakiest thing.” Steffi grins, accepting the champagne and calling Reece and the kids in. “I’ve never been so happy in my life! Who woulda thought I was such a country girl?” She laughs.

“It’s awesome,” Reece says, turning to the children. “Guys? What do you want to drink?”

“Can I have a Coke?” Jack says hopefully.

“A
Coke?
Are you
kidding
?” Reece looks at his six-year-old in horror. “Since when do you drink Coke?”

Jack shrugs. He tries again. “Sprite?”

“Nope. No soda.”

“Honey,” Steffi says, crouching down. “I don’t have any soda anyway. I do have apple cider, though. I could warm it up for you. How does that sound?”

“Great!” he and Eliza say gleefully.

Steffi turns to Reece and silently mouths, “Coke?” And he shrugs and grins. As far as they’re all aware, Callie has a strict no-soda rule.

And a strict no-gum rule. And a strict no-TV-before-bed rule. And a strict no-food-outside-the-kitchen rule. None of which have been adhered to particularly since she has been in the hospital.

Reece is trying his best. He has Honor to help, but Honor is flying out to be with Callie for most of the time. Reece is managing to work from home, so he is the one who is trying to sort out the playdates, and the classes, and the library books to be returned.

He is managing, but most of the time it’s only just. If this hospital trip is extended for much longer, he’s going to have to think seriously about bringing in some help. A babysitter, an au pair, something. He just can’t do it all by himself.

On the weekends, it is easier. He has always taken over the weekends, and driving out to see Steffi’s new place he can’t wait to take the kids for a hike, to see their faces when they first see the animals. He just can’t manage it every day. Frankly, he isn’t entirely sure how Callie manages it either.

“This is like the perfect country house,” Reece says. “What are you paying for rent?”

“I’m not!” Steffi says, setting out a platter of cheese with fig jam. “The house is in exchange for looking after Fingal.”

“This guy must totally have the hots for you,” teases Reece. “How much would it cost to pay someone to dogsit? A hell of a lot less than the monthly rent on this place I would think.”

“Daddy!” Eliza tugs on his shirt. “You said the
h
word.”

“I did? I’m sorry.”

“That’s twenty-five cents in the curse jar when we get home.”

“Okay,” he says with a shrug, waiting until she leaves the room to add, “Good thing she doesn’t follow me to work. She’d be a millionaire by now.” He peers out of the window as another car turns slowly into the driveway and pulls up at the house.

“Who do you know who drives a silver Volvo? Oh! It’s Ed and Lila and a young boy. I didn’t know they were coming.”

“The more the merrier. That’s Clay, Ed’s son.” Steffi goes to the front door, and soon the kitchen is filled with noise and movement as they all help Steffi with the finishing touches, gathering around the counter to eat the hors d’oeuvres and drink the champagne that Honor has brought.

Clay kicks around the edges of the room until Eliza corners him and questions him, then he starts to relax. Soon the three children are tearing around the house, making so much noise that Reece commands them all to go outside to play, and Steffi tells them to take Fingal with them.

“Just keep him away from the chicken coop!” Steffi shouts after them, and they raise hands to indicate they’ve heard, trooping off like a row of ducks, Eliza already having fallen in love with Clay, and Jack wanting to be wherever the big kids are.

 

They sit, eventually, in the dining room, which is beautifully set with Mason’s white Wedgwood china and crystal wineglasses, but with a classic Steffi touch: there are three galvanized steel pots on the table containing growing lettuce, and bowls of crisp red radishes, a heaping mound of soft bean sprouts and a dish of roasted pine nuts, so everyone can pick their own lettuce leaves straight from the pots and assemble their own salads.

It is, like so many family gatherings, easy and comfortable, with much laughter, and the great gray elephant in the room is not remarked upon. The children sit for a while, gobble up their food—they eschewed the tuna and took the turkey lemon meatballs as an alternative—and then go out to feed the chickens.

“How is she today?” Steffi is first to broach the subject. “I went in again yesterday afternoon and she was amazing—she was chatty, and eating, and she honestly looked great. Is there any news?”

Everyone looks to Honor, who is devoting most of her time to being with her daughter and is a fairly constant presence at the hospital: a book in hand, a blanket, a cup of tea, for the many times when Callie is asleep and Honor still cannot leave her side but sits peacefully in the room until she wakes up.

“She wasn’t so great this morning.” Honor sighs. “She was in pain again.”

“She was?” Lila jumps in. “But I thought they were managing it. I thought the pain that other time was just because she didn’t let them give her the oral medication at night?”

“That’s what we thought too, but she had it last night and still had breakthrough pain.”

“So what are they doing for that pain?” Lila asks. “Other than the IV of Dilaudid?”

“When I left they were talking about Oxycodone.”

“On IV or orally?” Lila asks.

“Orally.”

“And is that okay with the Decadron and the Zofran? Are there any adverse interactions? Did anyone ask?”

They all look at Lila blankly.

“What is Deca-what? And Zofran?”

“They’ve been giving her Decadron, which are the steroids, and Zofran, which is an anti-emetic, it stops her throwing up.”

“How do you
remember
that?” Reece is amazed.

“I wrote it down, and then I looked it all up on the Internet.”

“Wow.” Reece looks at her. “You’re pretty impressive.”

“No, I just know that you have to be your own advocate these days. You have to know exactly what’s going on and not be afraid to ask what you’re getting, and ask for other things if it’s not working.”

“Lila, we could do with you at the hospital,” Honor says thoughtfully. “I get a bit overwhelmed by all the terms and the names, and I’m not very good with doctors and nurses. My generation still thinks they’re all-powerful. I wouldn’t dare ask about anything.”

“Really? But . . . don’t you want to know?”

“I just trust that they’re doing everything in their power.”

“That’s just it. We always think that, but everyone’s fallible. They’re only human. Callie doesn’t have the strength to fight for herself right now, so someone needs to do it for her.”

All eyes are on Lila.

“What?”

“Honor’s right,” Reece says. “I’m there as much as I can be, but you’re amazing. I can’t be at the hospital during the day as much as I’d like to be, so maybe . . .” He tails off, starting again: “I guess what I’m trying to say is maybe you could be her advocate.”

“Yes.” She nods, after a long pause. “Of course. It’s not like I’m run off my feet with work.”

“It’s not? I thought you were starting a new business, dear?” Honor asks.

“I was planning on it, but I hadn’t planned on the worst recession since the thirties. Right now I’m a consultant, which basically means I have two clients, and can’t see myself getting any more in the immediate future.”

“But you’re okay financially, right?” Reece asks.

“Thank God they paid me a huge severance as part of the buy-out.” She looks at Ed and laughs. “Sorry. I keep forgetting that Ed goes into heart failure every time we talk about money.”

He grins. “It just that the English never talk about money. It’s the one thing I’m still not used to about living here.”

“And his Long Island Jewish love,” Lila puts on a thick accent, “talks about money all the time. I can’t help it. I have no shame. But, thank
God
, financially I am fine, and heaven knows I have enough free time on my hands. Do you know,” she says suddenly, leaning forward, “I had never seen the inside of a Starbucks at eleven o’clock in the morning before?”

“Is it . . . different?” Reece smiles.

“Yes! It’s hell! Tons and tons of young mothers with small children who run around screaming and laying their sugar-coated fingers on you, while the mothers ignore the horrible behavior and would be shocked to think anyone could possibly find their brats anything less than adorable.”

“She loves children.” Ed shrugs. “What can I tell you?”

“But you do love children,” Reece says. “At least, you love ours. And they love you.”

“Yes, well. That’s different. First of all, they’re the children of my best friend, and secondly, they are spectacularly well-behaved. I bet they’ve never run around Starbucks screaming. Even if they did Callie would have grabbed them and marched them out of there, putting their doughnuts in the trash can on the way out.”

“She’s right.” Reece grins. “My wife has always been the disciplinarian in our house.”

A fresh wave of silence and sadness as it hits them, yet again, that Callie is not there, and the reason why she is not there.

“So,” Steffi says, “we know she was in pain, but do they have any more results?”

“We should be getting some later today,” Reece says. “I’m going back to the hospital after I drop the kids home with Honor. I hope we’ll have some news soon.”

 

Reece and Ed are taking the kids for a hike, Lila and Honor are inspecting the garden, and Steffi is clearing up in the kitchen when a small blue truck appears. She frowns, then gasps as Stanley the handyman climbs out.

“Oh shit,” she mutters, smoothing her hair back and dashing to the mirror to wipe down her shiny skin—there was no point in bothering with makeup for her family, but she wasn’t expecting this guy to show up this afternoon.